IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/deveco/v135y2018icp449-460.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Widows' land rights and agricultural investment

Author

Listed:
  • Dillon, Brian
  • Voena, Alessandra

Abstract

This paper examines the connection between widows' land inheritance rights and land investments in Zambia. We study whether the threat of land expropriation upon widowhood deters households from fallowing, applying fertilizer, and employing labor-intensive tillage techniques. Variation in inheritance by widows is based on customary village practices, which we observe in surveys of village leaders. Controlling for possible confounding factors, both OLS and IV estimates show lower levels of land investment by married couples in villages where widows do not inherit. Concern over prospective loss of land by the wives reduces investment in land quality even while the husband is alive.

Suggested Citation

  • Dillon, Brian & Voena, Alessandra, 2018. "Widows' land rights and agricultural investment," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 449-460.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:deveco:v:135:y:2018:i:c:p:449-460
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2018.08.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304387818306072
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2018.08.006?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Esther Duflo, 2012. "Women Empowerment and Economic Development," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 50(4), pages 1051-1079, December.
    2. Nava Ashraf & Natalie Bau & Nathan Nunn & Alessandra Voena, 2020. "Bride Price and Female Education," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(2), pages 591-641.
    3. Dani Rodrik & Arvind Subramanian & Francesco Trebbi, 2004. "Institutions Rule: The Primacy of Institutions Over Geography and Integration in Economic Development," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 9(2), pages 131-165, June.
    4. Sarah Gavian & Marcel Fafchamps, 1996. "Land Tenure and Allocative Efficiency in Niger," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 78(2), pages 460-471.
    5. Philippe Aghion, 2005. "Growth and Institutions," Empirica, Springer;Austrian Institute for Economic Research;Austrian Economic Association, vol. 32(1), pages 3-18, March.
    6. Malungo, J. R. S., 2001. "Sexual cleansing (Kusalazya) and levirate marriage (Kunjilila mung'anda) in the era of AIDS: changes in perceptions and practices in Zambia," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 53(3), pages 371-382, August.
    7. Udry, Christopher, 1996. "Gender, Agricultural Production, and the Theory of the Household," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 104(5), pages 1010-1046, October.
    8. Paswel P. Marenya & Christopher B. Barrett, 2009. "State-conditional Fertilizer Yield Response on Western Kenyan Farms," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 91(4), pages 991-1006.
    9. Alberto Alesina & Paola Giuliano & Nathan Nunn, 2013. "On the Origins of Gender Roles: Women and the Plough," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 128(2), pages 469-530.
    10. Ingrid Yngstrom, 2002. "Women, Wives and Land Rights in Africa: Situating Gender Beyond the Household in the Debate Over Land Policy and Changing Tenure Systems," Oxford Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 30(1), pages 21-40.
    11. Fenske, James, 2011. "Land tenure and investment incentives: Evidence from West Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(2), pages 137-156, July.
    12. Guido Tabellini, 2010. "Culture and Institutions: Economic Development in the Regions of Europe," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 8(4), pages 677-716, June.
    13. Acemoglu, Daron & Johnson, Simon & Robinson, James A., 2005. "Institutions as a Fundamental Cause of Long-Run Growth," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 6, pages 385-472, Elsevier.
    14. Deininger, Klaus & Jin, Songqing, 2006. "Tenure security and land-related investment: Evidence from Ethiopia," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(5), pages 1245-1277, July.
    15. Daniel N. Posner, 2004. "Measuring Ethnic Fractionalization in Africa," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 48(4), pages 849-863, October.
    16. Antony Chapoto & T. S. Jayne & Nicole M. Mason, 2011. "Widows' Land Security in the Era of HIV/AIDS: Panel Survey Evidence from Zambia," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 59(3), pages 511-547.
    17. Matthias Doepke & Michèle Tertilt & Alessandra Voena, 2012. "The Economics and Politics of Women's Rights," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 4(1), pages 339-372, July.
    18. Amsalu, Aklilu & de Graaff, Jan, 2007. "Determinants of adoption and continued use of stone terraces for soil and water conservation in an Ethiopian highland watershed," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(2-3), pages 294-302, March.
    19. Ngoma, Hambulo & Mulenga, Brian P. & Jayne, T.S., 2014. "What Explains Minimal Usage of Minimum Tillage Practices in Zambia? Evidence from District-representative Data," Food Security Collaborative Policy Briefs 171875, Michigan State University, Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics.
    20. Gausset, Quentin, 2001. "AIDS and cultural practices in Africa: the case of the Tonga (Zambia)," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 52(4), pages 509-518, February.
    21. Ali, Daniel Ayalew & Deininger, Klaus & Goldstein, Markus, 2014. "Environmental and gender impacts of land tenure regularization in Africa: Pilot evidence from Rwanda," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 262-275.
    22. Cheryl Doss & Chiara Kovarik & Amber Peterman & Agnes Quisumbing & Mara Bold, 2015. "Gender inequalities in ownership and control of land in Africa: myth and reality," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 46(3), pages 403-434, May.
    23. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    24. Michael Morris & Valerie A. Kelly & Ron J. Kopicki & Derek Byerlee, 2007. "Fertilizer Use in African Agriculture : Lessons Learned and Good Practice Guidelines," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 6650.
    25. Markus Goldstein & Christopher Udry, 2008. "The Profits of Power: Land Rights and Agricultural Investment in Ghana," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 116(6), pages 981-1022, December.
    26. Place, Frank, 2009. "Land Tenure and Agricultural Productivity in Africa: A Comparative Analysis of the Economics Literature and Recent Policy Strategies and Reforms," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 1326-1336, August.
    27. William J. Burke & Thom. S. Jayne & J. Roy Black, 2017. "Factors explaining the low and variable profitability of fertilizer application to maize in Zambia," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 48(1), pages 115-126, January.
    28. Daron Acemoglu & Simon Johnson & James A. Robinson, 2001. "The Colonial Origins of Comparative Development: An Empirical Investigation," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 91(5), pages 1369-1401, December.
    29. Pender, John & Nkonya, Ephraim & Jagger, Pamela & Sserunkuuma, Dick & Ssali, Henry, 2004. "Strategies to increase agricultural productivity and reduce land degradation: evidence from Uganda," Agricultural Economics, Blackwell, vol. 31(2-3), pages 181-195, December.
    30. Brasselle, Anne-Sophie & Gaspart, Frederic & Platteau, Jean-Philippe, 2002. "Land tenure security and investment incentives: puzzling evidence from Burkina Faso," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 373-418, April.
    31. David E. Sahn & David Stifel, 2003. "Exploring Alternative Measures of Welfare in the Absence of Expenditure Data," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 49(4), pages 463-489, December.
    32. Allendorf, Keera, 2007. "Do Women's Land Rights Promote Empowerment and Child Health in Nepal?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 1975-1988, November.
    33. Natasha Gilbert, 2012. "African agriculture: Dirt poor," Nature, Nature, vol. 483(7391), pages 525-527, March.
    34. Frank Place & Peter Hazell, 1993. "Productivity Effects of Indigenous Land Tenure Systems in Sub-Saharan Africa," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 75(1), pages 10-19.
    35. Amber Peterman, 2012. "Widowhood and Asset Inheritance in Sub-Saharan Africa: Empirical Evidence from 15 Countries," Development Policy Review, Overseas Development Institute, vol. 30(5), pages 543-571, September.
    36. F. Place & K. Otsuka, 2002. "Land Tenure Systems and Their Impacts on Agricultural Investments and Productivity in Uganda," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(6), pages 105-128.
    37. Besley, Timothy, 1995. "Property Rights and Investment Incentives: Theory and Evidence from Ghana," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 103(5), pages 903-937, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Deininger, Klaus & Xia, Fang & Kilic, Talip & Moylan, Heather, 2021. "Investment impacts of gendered land rights in customary tenure systems: Substantive and methodological insights from Malawi," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).
    2. Siwan Anderson & Chris Bidner, 2021. "An Institutional Perspective on the Economics of the Family," Discussion Papers dp21-14, Department of Economics, Simon Fraser University.
    3. Katrina Kosec & Kamiljon Akramov & Bakhrom Mirkasimov & Jie Song & Hongdi Zhao, 2022. "Aspirations and women's empowerment: Evidence from Kyrgyzstan," Economics of Transition and Institutional Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(1), pages 101-134, January.
    4. Yang, Fanzheng & Hou, Lingling & Xia, Fang, 2024. "Intergenerational altruism, pessimism bias on tenure insecurity, and sustainable land use: Evidence from household grassland management in China," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 215(C).
    5. Dillon, Brian & Brummund, Peter & Mwabu, Germano, 2019. "Asymmetric non-separation and rural labor markets," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 78-96.
    6. Genicot, Garance & Hernandez-de-Benito, Maria, 2022. "Women’s land rights and village institutions in Tanzania," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 153(C).
    7. Burrone, Sara & Giannelli, Gianna Claudia, 2023. "Do Households Where Women Own Land Fare Better for Food Security? Evidence for Tanzania," IZA Discussion Papers 16382, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. Araujo, Rafael & Borges, Bruna & Costa, Francisco J M & Santos, Kelly, 2024. "Seeds of Disparity: the Gender Land Divide from Brazil's Agricultural Transition," SocArXiv dk4bc, Center for Open Science.
    9. Gay, Victor & Gobbi, Paula E. & Goñi, Marc, 2024. "The Customary Atlas of Ancien Régime France," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 93(C).
    10. Li, Bowei & Shen, Yueqin, 2021. "Effects of land transfer quality on the application of organic fertilizer by large-scale farmers in China," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 100(C).
    11. Yushi Chen & Xinhong Fu & Yuying Liu, 2022. "Effect of Farmland Scale on Farmers’ Application Behavior with Organic Fertilizer," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(9), pages 1-16, April.
    12. Alessandra Voena, 2019. "The Research Agenda: Alessandra Voena on Economics of the family in developed and developing countries," EconomicDynamics Newsletter, Review of Economic Dynamics, vol. 20(1), April.
    13. Bowei Li & Qiyan Zeng, 2022. "The Effect of Land Right Stability on the Application of Fertilizer Reduction Technologies—Evidence from Large-Scale Farmers in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(13), pages 1-13, July.
    14. Ali, Daniel Ayalew & Deininger, Klaus, 2022. "Institutional determinants of large land-based investments’ performance in Zambia: Does title enhance productivity and structural transformation?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    15. Unger, Eva-Maria & Lemmen, Christiaan & Bennett, Rohan, 2023. "Women’s access to land and the Land Administration Domain Model (LADM): Requirements, modelling and assessment," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 126(C).
    16. Kang, Munsu & Schwab, Benjamin & Yu, Jisang, 2020. "Gender differences in the relationship between land ownership and managerial rights: Implications for intrahousehold farm labor allocation," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    17. Djuikom, Marie Albertine & van de Walle, Dominique, 2022. "Marital status and women’s nutrition in Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 158(C).
    18. Kosec, Katrina & Mo, Cecilia Hyunjung & Schmidt, Emily & Song, Jie, 2021. "Perceptions of relative deprivation and women’s empowerment," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    19. Wang Ge & Shiyun Zhang & Yan Lu & Jiyu Jiang & Hui Jiang & Xiaona Cheng, 2022. "Can Higher Land Rentals Promote Soil Conservation of Large-Scale Farmers in China?," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(23), pages 1-14, November.
    20. Amadu, Festus O. & McNamara, Paul E. & Miller, Daniel C., 2020. "Yield effects of climate-smart agriculture aid investment in southern Malawi," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 92(C).
    21. Donkor, Emmanuel & Frimpong, Frederick Kwabena & Owusu, Victor, 2023. "Land tenure and investment in productive inputs in Ghanaian cocoa farming: A generalised structural equation modelling approach," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Kotchikpa Gabriel Lawin & Lota Tamini, 2018. "Droits de propriété foncière et performance des petits producteurs agricoles des pays en développement : une synthèse de la littérature empirique," CIRANO Working Papers 2018s-05, CIRANO.
    2. Bambio, Yiriyibin & Bouayad Agha, Salima, 2018. "Land tenure security and investment: Does strength of land right really matter in rural Burkina Faso?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 130-147.
    3. Alain Desdoigts & Hugues Kouassi Kouadio, 2013. "Deforestation, Migration, Land Appropriation and Reforms: Rural resilience against the backdrop of the Malthusian crisis in Ivory Coast," Erudite Working Paper 2013-01, Erudite.
    4. KOUADIO, Hugues & DESDOIGTS, Alain, 2012. "Déforestation, migrations, saturation et réformes foncières: La Côte d’Ivoire entre résilience rurale et litiges fonciers [Deforestation, migration, saturation and land reforms: Côte d'Ivoire betwe," MPRA Paper 49938, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Feyertag, Joseph & Childress, Malcolm & Langdown, Ian & Locke, Anna & Nizalov, Denys, 2021. "How does gender affect the perceived security of land and property rights? Evidence from 33 countries," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    6. Huntington, Heather & Stevens, Caleb, 2023. "Taking stock of global land indicators: A comparative analysis of approaches for a globally consistent land tenure security measure," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 124(C).
    7. Carol Newman & Finn Tarp & Katleen van den Broeck, 2015. "Property Rights and Productivity: The Case of Joint Land Titling in Vietnam," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 91(1), pages 91-105.
    8. Noufé, Tiatité, 2023. "Impact of land tenure security through customary law on agricultural productivity in Burkina Faso: Propensity score matching approaches," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    9. Place, Frank, 2009. "Land Tenure and Agricultural Productivity in Africa: A Comparative Analysis of the Economics Literature and Recent Policy Strategies and Reforms," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 1326-1336, August.
    10. Kimura, Yuichi, 2023. "Why are overlapping land rights disincentive against investment in agriculture?: customary land tenure institution in West Africa," MPRA Paper 116613, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Muna Shifa & Murray Leibbrandt & Martin Wittenberg, 2015. "Does tenure insecurity explain the variations in land-related investment decisions in rural Ethiopia?," SALDRU Working Papers 150, Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, University of Cape Town.
    12. Fenske, James, 2011. "Land tenure and investment incentives: Evidence from West Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(2), pages 137-156, July.
    13. Stéphane Korsaga, 2018. "Land Tenure Security, Land-Related Investments and Agricultural Performance in Sub-Saharan Africa: Efficiency or Equity? A Microeconomic Analysis Applied to the Case of Burkina Faso," Working Papers halshs-01699118, HAL.
    14. Gottlieb, Charles & Grobovšek, Jan, 2019. "Communal land and agricultural productivity," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(C), pages 135-152.
    15. Dillon, Brian & Brummund, Peter & Mwabu, Germano, 2019. "Asymmetric non-separation and rural labor markets," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 78-96.
    16. Kimura, Yuichi, 2021. "Shackles of Kinship Bonds: Land Tenure Institutions and Smallholders' Farm Investments in Ghana," 2021 Conference, August 17-31, 2021, Virtual 315049, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    17. Deininger, Klaus & Xia, Fang & Kilic, Talip & Moylan, Heather, 2021. "Investment impacts of gendered land rights in customary tenure systems: Substantive and methodological insights from Malawi," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 147(C).
    18. Séogo, Windinkonté & Zahonogo, Pam, 2023. "Do land property rights matter for stimulating agricultural productivity? Empirical evidence from Burkina Faso," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    19. Marc F. Bellemare, 2013. "The Productivity Impacts of Formal and Informal Land Rights: Evidence from Madagascar," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 89(2), pages 272-290.
    20. KOUADIO, Hugues, 2012. "Droit foncier, productivité et investissement dans l'agriculture : cas du café en Côte d'Ivoire [Land tenure, productivity and investment in agriculture: the case of coffee in Côte d'Ivoire]," MPRA Paper 49944, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Land tenure security; Widowhood; Land investment; Gender discrimination; African development; Farm productivity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O13 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Agriculture; Natural Resources; Environment; Other Primary Products
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • D23 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Organizational Behavior; Transaction Costs; Property Rights

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:deveco:v:135:y:2018:i:c:p:449-460. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/devec .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.